Review Referred Mail Ballots

Voter Focus gives you the option of reviewing referred mail ballots to verify they should be presented to the Canvassing Board. This option was designed primarily for counties employing temporary workers to return-process mail ballots. Such workers are typically instructed to refer any ballot where there is the tiniest doubt of acceptability. A permanent employee can then review each referred ballot to determine if referral is indeed appropriate.

To review referred mail ballots—or any returned mail ballot, including accepted ones—the user must be granted the user permission ReviewReturnedBallots. Users with this permission see the button Review Returned Ballots on the Vote By Mail tab.

The system option Print Canvassing Referral Sheet After Referral Confirmed determines whether a Canvassing Referral Sheet is printed immediately upon referral or is held until the referral is confirmed by the reviewer. (Not all referral reasons can necessarily generate a sheet. This is determined by the system option Print_Canvassing_Referral_Sheet_for_All_Reasons.)

Selecting the Print Canvassing Referral Sheet After Referral Confirmed option also makes available the Unreviewed and Referred Absentee Ballots report, which lists voters whose ballots were initially referred but have not yet been reviewed.

Should the reviewer determine that a ballot is acceptable, they can reverse the initial referral and accept the return.

If Voter Focus is set up to automatically schedule a notice such as an Absentee Referral Letter when a ballot is referred, scheduling of the letter will occur when a ballot is initially referred. Should the ballot be accepted during the review, Voter Focus will automatically unschedule the letter to the voter.

If a ballot's return status is changed during the review process, the ballot activity is recorded in the batch in which the ballot was initially returned. For reinstated ballots, this will be the Err batch.

  1. Collect the mail ballot envelopes that have been referred so far.
  2. Ensure that the election you want is in focus.
  3. Go to Vote By Mail > Review Returned Ballots.
  4. If your county uses return batches, enter any batch number. You need not match the batch number in which the ballots were initially processed.
  5. On the Review Returned Ballots dialog, swipe the bar code on the first envelope, enter the bar code number of the return, or click and find the voter.
  6. Evaluate the returned ballot as you normally would. (See Record the Return of Mail Ballots for more information.)
  7. The action you take now depends on your findings:
    • If you agree with the initial referral, click Leave Unchanged. A Canvassing Referral Sheet will be printed (according to your setting in Voter Focus Admin).
    • If you determine that the ballot should be accepted rather than referred, do the following:
      1. If the ballot is being reinstated due to receipt of a completed affidavit form, first select Affidavit Reinstatement.
      2. Click Reinstate Ballot. If a notice associated with the referral was scheduled, it will be unscheduled.
    • If you decide the ballot should be referred but for a different reason than initially indicated, select the correct reason from the Referral Reason list and then click Change Disposition. A Canvassing Referral Sheet will be printed (according to your setting in Voter Focus Admin). If a notice associated with the referral was scheduled for the original referral, it will be unscheduled, and another notice with the new referral reason will be scheduled in its place.
  8. Repeat this procedure for the next mail ballot, beginning with step 5.
  9. When you have reviewed all the ballots, run the Unreviewed and Referred Absentee Ballots Report. Any referred ballots that were not reviewed will appear on this report, so it is important to find those ballots and review them. When the report runs with no entries, you can be certain that all referred ballots have been reviewed.